Swarovski and Mastercard launched on Monday a VR shopping app for the Atelier Swarovski home décor collection.

Developed by Youvisit, the app showcases the decorative crystal home accessories collection and highlights the story and inspiration behind each piece, as well as their individual manufacturing processes and values.

The Atelier Swarovski app by Swarovski and Mastercard - Youvisit/iTunesThe setting of the shopping app is a virtual home, featuring five areas that are decorated with pieces made by Zaha Hadid, Kim Thomé, Aldo Bakker and Tomás Alonso. Consumers can browse and purchase pieces on the app through Mastercard’s digital payment services Masterpass.

"Atelier Swarovski Home is a masterfully crafted collection that is most dynamic when experienced first-hand,” said Nadja Swarovski, Member of the Executive Board, Swarovski Crystal Business.

“As our e-commerce business continues to grow, this partnership allows consumers a fully immersive shopping opportunity to interact with the product and then purchase seamlessly within the experience. The cutting-edge VR technology allows consumers to fully realize scale and engage more deeply with design details before making a purchase – anywhere. We’re grateful to have Mastercard join us for this exciting, first-time endeavor."

Swarovski joins a number of fashion labels that have delved into virtual reality. Massimo Dutti in 2016 launched Soft, a men’s capsule collection, with a virtual reality store that customers explored on a VR device. Matchesfashion also in 2016 launched a VR store, and Topshop in 2017 added a VR waterslide to its Oxford Street flagship in London.

GPShopper reported at the start of 2017 that consumers are interested in using virtual reality and augmented reality to enhance their shopping experiences. Over half of the respondents of GPShopper’s The Reality of Retail Tech report said that they are open to using AR to see how items might look in different colors or how an item might look in a home before buying it, the latter in which is the goal of Swarovski and Mastercard’s new app.

"At Mastercard, our goal is to provide consumers with the choice to shop when they want, how they want in a manner that is as seamless and secure as possible,” said Linda Kirkpatrick, EVP Merchants & Acceptance, Mastercard. “This means that merchants need to be able to engage their customers across multiple, technology platforms – in-store, online, in-app and via virtual and augmented reality.”

The Atelier Swarovski app is available for download on iTunes and will be available on Google Play stores in October.